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$7500 Photography Shopping Spree

I thought Don's "If you could do it all over" thread was really interesting- I learned a lot reading up on people's choices that I wasn't familiar with.

Here's the next challenge- You've got a $7500 budget and only have to get to 300mm and that can be done by teleconverter if you so choose. Use will be purely as amateur hobby, landscapes, people, the ocassional sporting event.

This isn't a hypothetical challenge, I'm planning on buying it at the end of the month! Can you come up with a better way to invest this money in gear than my current approach below (Assuming nothing new at Photokina)?

You can also put together a list of the essential software that I should plan on purchasing and its cost. (Seperate budget) I've been putting together my own list based on advertising and reviews and want to see if I'm going down the right path. My actual plan is to start shooting with JPEG for a few months until I'm comfortable with all of the new equipment and then start shooting in RAW when I'll have the time to spend learning post processing tools. Printer- From what I've read it seems that it is much cheaper to have an outside company do your 4x6 and larger printing than doing it yourself. If that's true then I'll just need a quality 4x6 'convenience' printer. If that's mistaken and my larger prints should be done in-house then include your printer choice with the software budget.

a *good printing setup would easily eat up half your budget already, not to mention a steep learning curve. Unless you desire to print on papers other than the usual photo mat/semi gloss/gloss and/or will be printing in large volume then outsourcing your prints is cheaper.

What escapes me is the large amount of money dedicated to tripod gear, and the selection of IS lenses. You do know that you need to turn IS off when on a tripod, and that a tripod is not really needed even at 200mm with IS?

What I am trying to say is, why the choice for both?
You could save yourself some money by getting the 70-200 f2.8 L.

It all depends on what you think you will use your tripod for I guess. It is rather cumbersome to take a tripod along, and set it up for a shot, having to put it away again and such. That is where the IS came in...

Why am I suggested a 1d mk2? Simple. It's lightyears beyond the 30D in terms of AF speed and accuracy. It's built like a tank (litteraly) and is fully sealed. If you've got cash to burn you can buy a body that WILL be around in 5 years without any issue.

Optionally you could replace the 17-40 with a 24-105 F4L IS or 24-70 F2.8 and spend less on tripod. Though you do lose some of the wide angel which if your shooting landscapes might be nice.

As far as software goes:

Photoshop Cs2. You can do pretty much everything you need in CS2. Shooting raw is NOT that hard and I'd suggest starting in raw and learning that. Most bodies listed in your consideration are Raw + jpeg compatible so you could always shoot in both (some do anyway for quick previews or no edits) and with a 1 series you could have jpeg go to a SD card, raws to your CF.

Tim-I don't think I'd want that big and heavy a body for a walk around hobby camera- it's almost 2x the size/weight. I'm not too concerned about the 30D being around in 5 years- that would be the most likely component to be replaced by newer technology anyway and my thinking was the any camera I buy will depreciate much quicker than glass so the more of my budget that is in glass the higher my resale value. But it really was the size and complexity that made me not even consider this camera, just as the Rebel was too small for me. Fully sealed and build quality -would have been nice.

Reason behind tripod gear- I know I'm going to want to purchase a larger lens down the road and I didn't want to have to replace my tripod. I'm also planning on shooting on windy days and from what I've been reading almost everyone is recommending the 1325 over the 1228. Same reason I spent an extra $100 on the bigger ballhead. The quick mounting kits are a luxury.

I will be using the 70-200 handheld as well as on the tripod. I know the IS isn't used on the tripod but I wanted it for when hand holding. From what I've read the weight of the 2.8 and size make it a more challenging lens to hand hold w/o IS. Is it true that it IS is more important on this lens than on say the 17-55?

Not saying I'm right on any of the above- just giving you what the reasons were behind the decisions. I'm still open to all ideas- heck, I switched from Nikon to Canon based on what I've learned on here.